


The Wedding Gift

by Zazou



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Adorable, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arranged Marriage, Cute, Dysfunctional Family, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family Dynamics, Fluff, Gen, Mild Angst, Sansa/Happiness, pure cinnamon roll
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-07
Updated: 2017-12-07
Packaged: 2019-02-11 16:24:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12939105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zazou/pseuds/Zazou
Summary: So far Sansa Stark has been adjusting well to her new life in Dorne, but now she's crying. Her betrothed, Quentyn is sent to comfort her.





	The Wedding Gift

“Your betrothed is crying.” 

Quentyn looked up from the cyvasse board at Elia leaning up against a nearby pillar. Sansa crying? That didn’t seem right. She’d been in fine spirits just this morning. During breakfast, she’d gushed over the collection of decorative fans Oberyn had bought her. So, what was the problem? 

Arianne pursed her lips and shot her young cousin a hard appraising look. 

“What did you do?” 

“Nothing!” Elia squawked indignantly. “A trunk was delivered to her rooms and she’s been in a state ever since.” 

Arianne eyed Quentyn over the cyvasse board. He shrugged trying to appear cavalier. 

“Her family probably sent her something and it’s made her homesick.” 

When Jon Arryn had proposed their match Quentyn had been very skeptical about the chances of a Northern maiden thriving in Dorne. After all, many people blamed his parents’ failed marriage on cultural differences and they’d had the advantage of being in love. But so far Sansa had been adjusting surprisingly well. She’d become an unofficial nursemaid to his younger cousins, delighting them with tales of wargs and grumpkins and teaching them the proper way to make flower wreaths. Tyene had even taken her under her wing and was teaching her about botany and “natural remedies.” Sansa seemed content until now. Mayhaps the novelty had worn off and the reality of the situation finally hit her? 

"You better go talk to her.” Arianne said moving her jade Spearman and cornering his ivory Catapult. 

Quentyn shook his head. He and his betrothed had only ever exchanged pleasantries and polite conversation. Whenever they were together his palms started to sweat. He had no idea how to go about comforting her. Honestly, he didn’t have much experience comforting people at all. 

“I don’t think she’ll want to be disturbed. Besides, it’s probably something personal.” 

Arianne gave him a withering look. She could be so effortlessly condescending. It was infuriating. Sweat began to drip down his neck.

“What? I’m sure she’d rather talk to that Poole girl than me anyhow.” 

“And how exactly are you going to woo her if she’s off crying into her handmaiden’s shoulder?” 

Damn. She was right. He was returning to Yronwood in a fortnight and after that, he probably won’t see Sansa again until their wedding. 

Elia plopped down next to him on the orange sette. 

"Go to her. I’ll take over for you here.” 

 

\---

A servant let him into Sansa’s rooms and told him that she was in her solar. Quentyn paused for a moment and leaned up against the doorway and took her in. There she was, his betrothed sewing golden beads onto a piece of ivory linen with her faithful companion Lady curled up in a ball at her feet. Quentyn cleared his throat and stepped into the solar. 

“Good afternoon, my lady.” 

“Oh, you startled me, my prince, I didn’t see you.” Sansa immediately stood up and dropped into a curtsey. Gods why were things still so formal between them?

Quentyn held out a small glass vial with a cork stopper, his excuse for coming over and disturbing her.

“Maester Caleotte says that this should protect your fair skin from the sun.” 

When Sansa had first arrived in Dorne her skin had turned lobster red and peeled off in great strips. Mortified, she’d insisted on hiding her “ruined” face by a wearing a diaphanous veil. Since then she’d taken to using colorful parasols to shield herself from the harsh sun. 

“Thank you.” She replied red spots appearing high on her cheeks. 

It seemed oddly intimate to even talk about her skin since Quentyn had seen and touched so little of it, just her hands really. Unbidden the image of Sansa lathering her naked body with the lotion flashed through his mind. Those long limbs, all that smooth porcelain skin. Gods, he hoped his urges would become more manageable once he was finally able to act on them. Their fingers brushed as she took the vial from him. Sansa’s blush deepened and spread down her neck. 

Quentyn cleared his throat and straighten his back. Focus, time to man up and address the problem. Whatever it may be. 

“My lady, is something troubling you?” 

“No, my prince. Everyone has been most kind.”

She was lying to him. They weren’t even married yet and she was lying right to his face. He couldn’t force her to confide in him. What was he meant to do? Tell her that he and his kin had been gossiping about her like a bunch of bored fishwives? 

Lady lifted her anvil-sized head and looked up at him with her mournful brown eyes. She let out a thin high-pitched whimper. Sansa reached down and scratched her behind her ear. When he looked down at Lady he noticed a large rosewood trunk in the corner of the room. There it was, the source of his betrothed’s sorrow.

“I don’t recall seeing that trunk before.” 

Sansa stiffened and her blue eyes widened. Well, at least she was bad at keeping secrets that was mildly comforting.

“Is it another gift from my uncle?”

Her face crumbled and her shoulders sagged. 

“I’m so sorry.” Sansa blurted out. “I’ve been terribly foolish and done something most improper!” 

Quentyn couldn’t imagine Sansa doing anything improper. It was part of what made her so intimidating. 

“My lady, I’m sure whatever you’ve done…”

“I know it wasn’t my place. I should have asked first or better yet just kept my nose out of other people’s business.” Sansa stared down at the floor refusing to meet his gaze. 

“I was only trying to help but I’ve overstepped and made a mess of everything!”

Normally, Quentyn would roll his eyes at such a melodramatic statement but she seemed sincere.

“Sansa, I can’t help if you don’t…”

“I wrote to your mother.” 

What? Quentyn’s heart sank. His mother…Gods it was so strange for him to think of her as something other than a distant memory. He remembered her as a boisterous woman, fond of dancing, sailing, and racing sand steeds. She sucked her teeth when she was annoyed and openly mocked the septon. Quick to anger but even quicker to laugh, she wore her heart on her sleeve. His mother had taught Quentyn to swim as a boy and told him tales of Prince Ny Sar, and Garris the Grey. He remembered standing in the doorway and watching her cradle little Trystane in her arms singing him a Norvoshi lullaby and wondering if she had done the same for him when he was a babe. 

The last time Quentyn had seen her had been in the courtyard at Sunspear when she and his father were sending him off to Yronwood. She and father had been arguing for days on end and his mother had shaved her head in the Norvoshi style as a sign of protest. She thought long hair was cumbersome and ugly and only ever grew hers out when things were going well with father. Quentyn had no idea that it would be the last time but when he returned to Sunspear for the harvest festival he’d been informed that she had gone to back Norvos indefinitely. 

“What …What did you say… I mean, write?” 

Sansa took a deep breath and smoothed invisible wrinkles out of blue gossamer skirts.

“I introduced myself and told her about our betrothal and…. I told her that I would love for her to attend the wedding and that if she was agreeable I would ask your father to invite her as a wedding gift to me.” 

Gods, he hadn’t even thought about inviting his mother to their wedding. What kind of son was he? Did he even want her there? His gut reaction was yes. Of course, he wanted her there! She was his mother after all. But the idea of seeing her again after all this time made his stomach turn and his palms sweat.

What did she look like after all this time? Did she still smell like cloves and eucalyptus? Did she still wear her fingernails long and file them down to sharp points like tiger claws? What would Arianne say? And what about Trystane? He wasn’t really sure how much his little brother remembered of their mother. Would his mother bring a paramour to make his father jealous? Some strange man with a moustache and blue hair. If she did Arianne would probably seduce him as some sort of sick revenge. 

The wedding breakfast would be an absolute nightmare. Sansa would chirp along merrily while everyone else glared daggers at each other. Trystane would play with his food and do that nervous swallowing thing. Father would appear calm and collected. His voice even and measured as he undermined his wife at every turn Uncle Oberyn would be far less subtle. He’d needle his good sister throughout the meal with his pointed japes until finally, she erupted making a huge scene in front of everyone. Then he’d act all surprised and innocent, and gentle Sansa would start crying. She’d see Quentyn as a weak boy unable to defend his own mother and lose all respect for him thus dooming their marriage. 

"I was going to ask your father for permission I swear! I just wanted to get in contact with her first before I went to the trouble of bothering him. And…well…this morning the trunk arrived.” 

Quentyn cautiously approached the mysterious trunk bursting at the seams with anxiety and anticipation. He lifted the heavy lid up and was instantly flooded with disappointment. It was a beautifully crafted tapestry depicting three giant bears dancing down the Sinner’s Step.

It was something you could pick up in any market in Norvos, the kind of gift you would give to anyone. An empty gesture, a thoughtless token conveying no deep sentiment or personal connection. But what more could he expect? How could she give him a meaningful gift when she didn’t even know him? Still, bitter disappointment gnawed at him as his stomach turned into knots. 

“It didn’t come with a note so I assume it means that she wouldn’t be attending,” Sansa said her voice growing small and thin. 

He clenched his fists and bit the inside of his cheek. His mother was a craven hypocrite! If his father was a “monster” for fostering Quentyn than what did that make her? And now it turned out that she didn’t love him enough to come to his wedding. She’d withstood the pains of childbirth for him, but apparently tolerating his father’s presence for a few days was too much to ask for. Was she just not interested? Or mayhaps she was too busy with her new life whatever that entailed. 

Quentyn ground his teeth and blinked back tears. Whatever the reason it was her lose! Quentyn was a man now! A prince, a knight! He hadn’t needed her to earned his seven oils. He hadn’t needed her learn how to tame a sand stead or to win his first melee. So, he damn sure didn’t need her now! 

But why didn’t she want him? Didn’t she miss him at all? Everyone said that a mother’s love for their child was the purest strongest form of love in the whole world. If his own mother didn’t love him enough to come to his damn wedding how in the seven hells was anyone else going to love him? 

“Please don’t be upset with me.” Sansa pleaded looking up at him with her big watery eyes. Quentyn shook his head. He could never be upset with someone so well meaning. 

“I… I promise I’m not angry with you.”

He reached out and placed his hand on her shoulder. Suddenly, she lunged at him wrapping her arms around his neck and burying her face in his jerkin. Bewildered, Quentyn froze for a second before relaxing into the surprise embrace. She smelled like lemon and rosemary. 

“It’s not your fault. You were just trying to be thoughtful.” 

Honestly, if he had to describe his betrothed in one word it would be thoughtful. She was always looking for any and every opportunity to help her new family. Taking dictation for his lord father, studying with Trystane, mediating fights between Obella, Dorea and Loreza. Even her odd habit of watching the Sand Snakes practice in the training yard and granting the victor her favor. Most of his cousins thought it a silly jape but he knew Obara was very touched by the gesture. Before Quentyn had seen this as another reason to be intimidated by her but now.... he was just impressed by how much she cared. 

“I wanted to surprise you.” She mumbled into his chest. Quentyn shivered at the feel her hot breath through his thin cotton jerkin.

“Well, you definitely succeed there.” 

“But not in the way I’d hoped.” 

Quentyn had always found pouting irritating but Sansa managed to make it oddly endearing.He took a chance and snaked his other arm another her waist. The pair slipped into a companionable silence. 

This was the moment. The moment, Quentyn was supposed to say something meaningful. Something sweet yet poignant, something that would make her fall in love with him. Uncle Oberyn would probably advise him to tell her how he felt but honestly he wasn't ready for that. His mother's gift had brought a lot of raw and conflicting emotions to the surface and he didn't want to share them yet. There had been more than enough emotion and vulnerability for one day. 

"Do you want to get some lemon cakes?" 

He could feel her smile and nod. Quentyn grinned and lead her towards the kitchens.


End file.
